Dr Snuggles to resume duties after 20 years

Continuing the trend for reviving classic toons from yesteryear, the 20-year-old animated series Dr Snuggles is set to return to TV screens with a new series.

UK investment outfit Matrix Securities has put up some of the finance, and has teamed up with Atomic Entertainment's md Sean O'Kelly to kick-start the hunt for a co-production partner to make a pilot and 26 new half-hours of the show.

{We're looking for a French animation studio to co-produce the new show,{ O'Kelly told C21. {Teaming up with a French studio make a lot of sense as we can get up to 30% of the budget from a CNC grant,{ he added, {so long as 25% of what we spend in France is covered by a local pre-sale.{

O'Kelly is currently sifting through proposals and expects to make a decision about which studio to go with in two weeks. After that, the new series of Dr Snuggles will be a co-pro between the French studio and a new joint venture set up by Matrix and the creator of the original 80s series, Jeffrey O'Kelly. His son Sean will be credited with an exec producer role.

The original series is also being cleaned up to allow pre-buyers of the new show to take both series as a package. International distribution arrangements for the new series have yet to be decided.

The original 13×30' series was created by Snuggles Enterprises and produced by KidPix. Featuring the voice of Peter Ustinov as an eccentric but good-natured pogo-sticking inventor, the show is still on air on Germany's WDR.